when I was a little girl I wanted to
sing that's all I could think about
doing I talk when you can sing and I
would sing all the time to everyone's
amazement and annoyance and it didn't
matter if we look at me I'm settling it
up there and it didn't matter to me if
anybody was watching or listening
because it was all that I was and all
that I wanted to be and all that I could
think about doing was singing singing
singing port my poor brother so it's all
I could do is talk about singing and I
talked about it and asked I have piano
lessons no could I have music lessons no
could I have singing lessons I kept
begging and begging and begging and
finally I wore my parents down and they
said all right I'll tell you what that's
about eight years old you can audition
for us tomorrow night in the living room
and we'll decide whether you're good
enough to get lessons and you know
you're eight or nine I didn't know
people didn't have to audition for their
parents so I practiced I got dressed up
I went into the living room the next
night and both my parents were sitting
on a couch with a clipboard and a scotch
and water
on ice and my my dad said welcome to the
audition what will you be singing this
evening and I said well I'll be doing a
very popular top forty number called
sunny sunny yesterday my life was filled
with rain and I am just going for it and
about halfway through the song my father
was well Bobo Bobo you can stop now and
he said you will have another number I
only practiced this one he was yeah but
do you know another song
III know the Troggs he goes okay go
please sing that for us so I did I
feel it in my fingers yes another fun I
feel it in my toes let me hear you sing
with me
your love is all around me that's all
that feeling girl I'll get stop right
there
also my dad said and he said we'll let
you know in the morning okay but I just
was like okay thank you and I was sure I
was gonna get singing lessons yeah how
could you not give me singing lessons
after that I didn't get singing lessons
he said my voice was ordinary and I
would not be famous for singing so no
lessons so I stopped singing and I
stopped singing for a long long time and
I know that I'm not alone I know for
every person in here something has
stopped you from a big dream or an idea
you had or something that was just all
you and you couldn't help but express it
until someone stopped you maybe it was a
teacher like my friend Jonathan Jonathan
in the third grade his parents were
going through a divorce and he hadn't
really talked to anybody about it he
didn't have anybody to talk to about it
and he got an assignment to write his
biography in the third grade it was
gonna be a short paper in the third
grade but he thought this was my chance
and he wrote all about his feelings
about the divorce and his sadness and
his confusion and missing his dad and
the teacher gave him back the paper with
all the misspellings circled in red and
he got a D he got a D on his life in the
third grade
and he quit reading he quit liking
school he just stopped and joined what
the whole purpose was maybe it's your
parents maybe your parents stopped you
maybe it's your friends maybe it's your
workplace Gallup did an international
poll 149 countries and found that over
70% of us are disengaged at work 70%
that means when you leave your car in
the morning to go in you leave the
windows down just a little so your soul
can breathe while your body goes into
work 70% I would argue that it's the
sheer adult nests of the workplace I get
to travel around a lot and speak to a
lot of different aged groups and
sometimes I take things like Donuts and
if I go into a third grade classroom
with a plate full of donuts the place
goes crazy its donut day they're so
happy if I take some donuts into my
college classroom they're still thankful
say hey dr. B that's cool thank you but
if I take Donuts into a corporate
boardroom this is what you're here you
didn't get chocolate
we don't inherit fear we don't inherit
boredom and passivity we are socialized
toward them we accept them we fall in
line like a bunch of lemmings as that's
the kind of behavior that we're supposed
to do as an adult as a grown-up as
someone of agit numbers of years but how
sad is that
I'm here to tell you that I think we all
need to tap into what famous
paleontologists Stephen Jay Gould called
the most important science known to man
but the least understood neoteny rather
than tell you that's the whole long you
know description of what it is patio
morphic and anthropological assed words
this kind of fun to play in the snow
neoteny is the maintaining of childlike
qualities throughout our entire lives
it's what we inherit on the day we're
born all the singing dancing joy love
the things that make us inextricably and
so fantastically human they're just
given to us it doesn't help you to get
cosmetic-surgery you're not gonna stay
young by buying a red sport car sports
car or even having a cocktail the way
that you stay young it's like this group
of young I mean this group of old men in
1981 went to a home that had been
transferred to 20 years prior in their
life so they're seven years old they
pull up in a van
some of them are in walkers some of them
with canes they're all arthritic there
they're gonna stay there for five days
and inside this house everything is like
20 years prior the magazines the music
the television shows the food the
clothing this was a brilliant experiment
by Harvard psychologist Ellen Langer
before these guys went into this house
they measured the biomarkers that they
could measure at that time things like
finger length you know vision dexterity
they stayed in our house for five days
playing talking reading as if it was 20
years prior after five days when they
came out of that house their vision had
improved their finger length increased
what pictures by biased judges took a
look at before and after pictures and
thought they had had something done they
looked a lot younger their brain scans
looked a lot younger five days Ellen
Langer was afraid to let these results
out because it seems extraordinary and
it is she couldn't even tell about the
games of football they were playing in
the yard why would they like they were
waiting for the van to take them back
they were putting touch football and
they'd gone in and canes she said she
had put their minds in a younger time
and their body just went along for the
ride if that five days could change
those gentlemen that much then think
what we could do with our own neoteny
with our own childlike qualities if we
started today and why is this important
it's important because aging
institutions and companies are going to
kill and continue to oppress all of the
creativity and renewal and dynamic
dynamicism that stuff being dynamic
being dynamic they kill it in
individuals but most important is you
this should matter
to you because we forget you get one
turn around this planet you get one
chance to make your impact one chance to
be the biggest best person that you can
be I took a friend of mine shopping one
time and she was she had terminal cancer
and I was trying on a dress and I said
does this dress make me look a little
dowdy or something and she said Rhonda
you don't have that kind of time and
none of us do
what fabulous idea have you been keeping
inside what problem could your neoteny
solve what company could you create
where do you think all the wild wooly
ideas that change the world come from
fluid self-renewing neoteny thats who
and that can be you so what I'd like to
suggest today is that we begin to define
old in a different way
o your outlook the lens at which you
look at life I spoke to a someone should
have warned me not to do this but I
spoke to an assembly of twelve and
thirteen-year-olds
1,200 of them in one room and we were
talking about dreams and I took my
little microphone I said you know we're
gonna what is a dream and why dreams are
important and I ran up into the audience
and I picked this young man and I said
what about you if you knew you could be
anything do anything have anything go
anywhere that you could possibly do be
have or go what would it be I got
nothing
I got nothing at 12 and you and I both
know he had a dream I just didn't want
state in front of friends think how
small we become so soon again we
volunteered for this we let the world
beat it out of us what about your
language I have a friend who turned 80
and decided that she would like to go on
a horseback riding trip she had never
been on a horse
can you imagine what her friends were
saying to her you're gonna get hurt so
while she was drinking tequila on a
horse watching the sunset in Baja her
friends were home knitting you gotta say
to yourself yes Bob Dylan said if you
aren't busy being born you're busy dying
say yes to things don't say oh I don't
do that oh I've never tried that it
seems dumb oh this happens at 12 and it
happens at 120 change the language to
yes
and lastly what about your drives and
I'm not talking just about your work
lucky you if you can't wait to get up in
the morning to go to work you've created
that and it's the way you explain it to
yourself and it's all that good yay but
if you don't what other drives might you
have what other ways can you find to
make yourself want to get out of bed in
the morning and go I'm back cuz they're
out there sign hustles doing good for
some other people I started nonprofit
and dream makers makes dreams come true
for adults 18 and older who for any
number of reasons could not make a dream
come true before they're given a
terminal diagnosis so we've made 22
dreams come true so far and here's the
thing you guys nobody asks for stuff
nobody asks for anything just for them
when your life is distilled down to its
very essence and you have six months
left on the earth you know what you want
to do you want to play with someone you
love things like go to a you know
baseball game with my son I want to go
to a football game with my family I want
to go to Disneyland never been play and
loved neoteny characteristics and why
should it take us till our last six
months to realize that's what really
matters that that's what's really
important so if we can redefine old if
we can look at ourselves as the young
child that we were Dostoevsky said there
are two great days in your life the day
you're born and the day that you figure
out why biologists Loren eiseley was
sitting in a forest and saw something
that most people will never ever see he
had been on a long hike he sat down and
was looking out at this big meadow and
he saw crows just tons of crows coming
in and robbing all the nests of the
sparrows taking their eggs and the
sparrows were fighting valiantly against
this black bird of death but they were
outnumbered and outsized
and when the crows had taken all the
eggs and flew away
it was very silent like a funeral still
like now and then he said all of a
sudden one little tree
this little bird started to sing and
then another bird started to sing and
another and another and pretty soon the
whole forest was filled with birdsong
once again
these birds weren't singing because they
didn't know what it happened
they weren't singing because they
weren't sad and mournful but they were
singing because that's what birds are
born to do
I lost my song for a while I am here to
remind you that you are born to die
young as late as possible that you have
inherited all the childlike qualities
that make life worth living and that you
can access them and should access them
at any time at all times you should fall
in love again and again you should
forgive and forget you should avoid
growing bitter cynical bored and sad you
should sing your song you should
celebrate your days and your doughnuts
and like my friend's dad you have either
your childhood child you're actually
carrying this he's 93 carrying his
great-grandson on a playground in Rio de
Janeiro you have a child like that on
you in you with you all the time
so when you get a chance I hope you
stand up
take aim and throw your snowball
[Music]
[Applause]